Cyber attack: Region's hospitals on high alert

Malita Javier
|
13 May, 2017, 10:20

Scottish health secretary Shona Robison said: "Scottish Government health officials are now working closely with affected boards to assess the extent of the problem, and take steps to isolate affected systems, which have been affected by a ransomware cyber-attack of the kind which has also affected health trusts in NHS England".

"Like many other companies, FedEx is experiencing interference with some of our Windows-based systems caused by malware", a spokeswoman said in a statement.

Its report in March said: Ransomware on connected watches, fitness trackers and TVs will present a challenge to manufacturers, and it is not yet known whether customer support will extend to assisting with unlocking devices and providing advice on whether to pay a ransom.

Kurt Baumgartner, principal security researcher at Kaspersky, says the malware has translations in dozens of languages, such that instructions for paying the ransom are displayed in the language set for that computer.

Ransomware attacks are on the rise around the world. The committee denied the reports.

A massive ransomware campaign appears to have attacked a number of organisations around the world.

"And some of them may not be well prepared for such attacks", Chris Camacho, chief strategy officer with cyber intelligence firm Flashpoint, said. WanaCrypt0r 2.0 is suspected to have been developed from the ETERNALBLUE exploit released earlier by another group of hackers, ShadowBrokers, who claimed ETERNALBLUE was stolen from the NSA's hacking tools.

Spain did not say which companies were affected, but Telefonica, a telecom giant said it had detected an incident which affected some of its employees.

Megafon, a Russian telecommunications company, was also hit by the attack.

A spokesman for British Prime Minister Theresa May said she was being kept informed of the incident.

Spain, meanwhile, took steps to protect critical infrastructure in response to the attack. But there's no evidence so far that patient data has been accessed, NHS Digital said.

"This attack was not specifically targeted at the NHS and is affecting organisations from across a range of sectors", NHS Digital, the computer arm of the health service, said in a statement.

"This is one of the largest global ransomware attacks the cyber community has ever seen", said Rich Barger, director of threat research with Splunk, one of the firms that linked WannaCry to the NSA.

"Both staff and patients were frankly pretty appalled that somebody, whoever they are, for commercial gain or otherwise, would attack a health care organization", he said.

Spain's National Center for the Protection of Critical Infrastructure said it was communicating with more than 100 providers of energy, transportation, telecommunications and financial services about the attack even if basic services had not suffered any disruption.

Hospitals across England have canceled appointments and turned away patients after suffering an apparent cyberattack.

Tom Griffiths, who was at the hospital for chemotherapy, said several cancer patients had to be sent home because their records or bloodwork couldn't be accessed.

Pictures posted on social media showed screens of NHS computers with images demanding payment of $300 worth of the online currency Bitcoin, saying: "Ooops, your files have been encrypted!"

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When the ransomware takes over a computer, the attackers are pretty explicit in their demands, Segura said. EDT and grew throughout the day, affecting the Spanish telecom giant Telefonica and other companies.

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The spokesman, Jan Op Gen Oorth, declined to give further details Friday so as not to jeopardize the ongoing investigations. Hospitals in London, northwest England and other parts of the country reported problems with their computer systems Friday.

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